Life
by penumbra owl
Summary: Sometimes, all one needs to live is to lose their world.
1. Chapter 1

I don't know why the world ended. One minute, my life was normal: a family, kids, house, pets – fuck, I even had a sweet little pay bump coming my way in a few weeks. I was happy. Content.

…Not miserable.

And then the life I was going through…stopped.

It didn't even end with a bang; no dramatic last minute epiphany, no sudden realization that there was any kind of deeper meaning behind my existence. It just…slipped away. Vanished. Like salt in water, my world dissolved, and with it, me.

Perhaps it was for the best? I mean, while life wasn't bad, it certainly wasn't something I sprang out of bed every morning to greet. Hell, some days all I could do was open my eyes – not even that tired, because why wouldn't I have gotten enough sleep? My life was perfect – and stare. At the clock. The walls. The suit I had laid out the previous night.

Those mornings were the worst. And the best. At least, I think that they were. (best or worst?)

But that all ended. It must have been in the middle of the night, because all I remember is shrugging out of my jacket, slipping under the covers, and…lights out. I don't even remember my husband coming in. He was nice, my husband. A strong man, a little loud and adventurous, and far too bold, but that's why I married him. I needed someone like that is my life.

That's what I believed. That's what my parents believed. And that's certainly what society believed.

How could it not be true?

But my world was over, and everything in it – including me – was over. The curtain had descended for the last time, and I knew with an alien certainty that it would never lift again.

_Life._

So why did my eyes open, a thin film of dew glittering like diamonds over my boxer-clad body, in the middle of the forest? A shift, a _blur_ – and two eyes of storm-grey were suddenly there, blocking out the endless sky above.

"…Hello."

And blackness.


	2. Fucking Black Eyes

Coming aware of your surrounding after having been forcefully rendered unconscious feels unusual, like swimming downwards, deeper and deeper until it feels like the pressure is about to crush you into small, watery chunks and then –

Light. Pain. The distinct sensation that _this isn't how it's suppose to be._

But more. Much more. Because that sense of displacement, that incredibly unnerving conviction that _you are not welcome_ and never _will_ be welcome is daunting. And frightening. And a little bit unfair, considering I didn't think I was at fault.

No one asks to be spared when everything that makes up their soul is gone.

I hear a low-pitched whine vibrate the air around me, and my world finally comes into focus. I'm lying spread-eagle on a hard, stone floor, and though it's not warm, it's not terribly cold either. That, or I'm too numb to distinguish the temperature.

I'm surrounded by four walls, whose rough(?), dark brown surfaces both entrap and embrace. One wall is defined by a sturdy looking door, a small viewing space three-quarters up its length providing the only light available. Despite the dawning realization that I'm apparently in a cell of some kind, I feel disconnected. Unplugged. A disinterested spectator in a sea of _twisted_.

**IT'S GONE.**

I stand up, noticing absently the stiffness burrowed in my muscles and the smudges of earth that stain my usually clean body. My skin feels stretched too tight, as if I moved the wrong way I would split down the middle and be left a quivering, carnelian parody of a human –

I stretch, and my body relaxes.

The tightness remains.

I walk over to the single unique feature of this space, trailing my hand along the _yes_ – it _is_ rough – wall. Bits of my skin snag and peel, but it's _rough_ and real and _alive_ in its own, limited way, so it's worth it. I reach the door and peer through the viewing space. Soft, flickering light teases me eyes, and I wonder at the creepiness of a stuttering lightbulb before understanding dawns and I realize its fire.

The apathy that had gripped me since first opening my eyes in this impossible world (it's not my own, I _know_ this but will never be able to explain it) surges at the sight and a heavy force presses me back to the floor, not even allowing me to crawl back to the space I had woken up from. Shadows dance and quiver at the edges of my sight, and slowly cover me as if to say _you're done_. We made a mistake. You need to _go_ _home_ now.

**IT'S GONE.**

A pulse of ice shoots down my spine and I gasp, sitting bolt upright. Curled in the core of my self, a small spark of teeth and song and _fire_ thrashes at the chill, clutching blanket that smothers my being. For a brief second, I feel my heart stutter, skip, stop, and the small raging piece of fury finally lies still.

My life.

**IT'S GONE.**

And blackness.

*** Life ***

The next time I wake, the world is screaming.

"Fuckin' shinobi, you – "

"Oh Kami don't let it – "

"What the hell are you – "

"Squad Tsume, go."

I've been moved since the last time I regained consciousness. My safe, suffocating walls of earth have been replaced with an arching tunnel of slate grey stone, the top of which curves out of sight into an inky blackness. I am still only covered by a pair of my cotton, black boxers, but this time I am not cold.

A trembling hand inches up my chest and presses hard against the flesh. Silence.

I have no heartbeat.

For a second I scramble against the tilting sensation that overwhelms me, as if I'm liquid being poured down a long, narrow tube that reaches to the center of the earth. I'm dead.

Just like I should be.

Just like what the rest of my world is.

**IT'S GONE.**

I struggle upright, my cold, unfeeling, _dead_ body rebelling against the unnatural force that directs it against nature's design. One step, two steps; it's like learning to walk again. I take one stride too quickly and trip over my own legs, crumbling to the ground and in the process lightly grazing the skin on my left knee. Even as I stare at the bloodless wound, no pain reaches me.

I want to go home. Where are the shadows from before? I want to go _home_. Didn't they promise I would be reunited with my drowned world? My life of dust? My empty existence?

They lied. They must have, because I'm still here. (What if this is death? Real death?)

But it couldn't be. I was still moving, and _the dead don't move_.

By this point, I had regained my footing and was inching my way to the source of the noise. I had to see more than these walls that I now hated with a burning passion, walls that had witnessed my death and didn't care. I had to see people and life and passion and something to indicate I was not entirely abandoned.

I had to make sure I was real. And the walls couldn't do that.

"Why won't you die! – "

"Please please please ple-"

"I said stop – "

"Squad Hane, eliminate the remainder."

I turned the corner, and knew I was dead. The shadows hadn't lied; they had kept true to their word and had delivered me to my afterlife. For it must be hell I was in to explain the black-clad demons that torn through the people standing, fighting, and falling in front of me. Figures of nightmares that moved too fast, too smooth, too powerfully to be anything but inhuman. Hellfire spewed from their hands and mouths, and the earth ripped asunder under their tread. Some ran along the walls like murder-driven lizards while other clung to the low ceiling with all the predatory intentions of a bat or bird of prey picking out its next meal.

Blood clogged the air and painted the unforgiving ground. Painted the soles of my feet as I wobbled out of the unreality behind me and into the unreality in front of me. Just a few meters in front of me, one of the desperately fighting human reached into a bag he had slung over one shoulder and pulled from it a white slip of paper covered in black scribbles. Furrows etched his face and sweat slicked his features as he focused on the paper, before suddenly hurtling it away from himself.

I was stunned when a crackling shockwave split the sound of battle and an amorphous sphere of fire lit the cave to blinding proportions. In the distraction, the man who had flung the piece of paper darted away from the battle and straight towards me. The fire must have temporarily blinded him, because it wasn't until we were separated by but a meter that he jerked to a stop before he could run over my frozen form.

"Who's there? Where the fuck are you?" he snarled, brandishing a sword in one hand wildly.

I tilted my head to one side, puzzled that he seemed unable to see me yet. Surely he must have covered his eyes before the explosion, knowing what was about to happen?

"Fucking shinobi, you little shit. You think you can scare me?! I'll kill you!" At that, I stepped back, startled at the hostile words. A sliver of unease raced down my limbs; the dangerous man in front of me thought I was the enemy. Despite the recent revelation that I was dead, I wasn't sure that I wanted to be attacked.

Noticing that I was still covered in the shadow of the tunnel behind me, I stepped forward, allowing the fires of battle in front of me to bath my figure in enough light for the man to see that I –

_Thunk._

Prickly, not-pain oozed through my body, as if my soul and body were connected by Velcro and I was being slowly peeled apart. Wild, storm-grey eyes peered accusingly at my face before locking onto my eyes. A maniac grin that trembled split his face as he leaned in.

"You must be one of them, a spy or something. Slippery little bastards you freaks of nature are. Thinking I wouldn't remember you. I brought you in. Good strong slave, I was thinking. Thinking, 'this will get me some money'."

Dissolving. Like salt in water. Still there, but…unseen. Ungraspable.

"Then you fucking died. Or I guess, faked dying. Stopped breathing and all that shit. Probably led your fucking pals back here when we threw you out of the holding cell. I was even going to bury you because I felt a little guilty, you know? I have a daughter your age, hates my guts, but what am I saying? Hehehe. You're dead now, and that's what matters."

Hysterical laughter. Is it mine? I'm not a cat, and I don't want nine lives if it means I have to die nine times.

"Fucking Black Eyes."

**IT'S GONE.**

And blackness.


End file.
